


Seventeen Weddings and a Divorce

by something_nextto_normal



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child - Thorne & Rowling
Genre: Divorce, Father-Daughter Relationship, Harry Potter Epilogue Compliant, Harry Potter Next Generation, Marriage Proposal, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Multi, My First Fanfic, Parenthood, Pregnancy, Sister-Sister Relationship, Twins, Weddings, could be cursed child compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-26
Updated: 2020-05-26
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:27:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24395746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/something_nextto_normal/pseuds/something_nextto_normal
Summary: Lucy Weasley started making a list of all the weddings she'd been to after she attended the fifteenth.
Relationships: Lucy Weasley/Original Male Character(s), Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 14





	Seventeen Weddings and a Divorce

The first wedding Lucy Weasley ever attended was her Aunt Ginny’s. She doesn’t remember it, since she was only five months old, but there are plenty of articles on it due to the identity of the groom, and in one of the pictures printed in the Daily Prophet you can just make out Lucy's parents, beaming from ear to ear while holding her and Molly. It’s odd to see them that happy together-she was only three when they got divorced, after all, and though they’re friends now, she can’t picture them in love. That might sound sad, but for Lucy it’s just a fact of life. They certainly never loved each the way Uncle Harry and Aunt Ginny do-in all of the pictures he looks as if he might be dreaming, and she stares at him as though he’s her whole world. They still do that, even now, almost 28 years later.

Lucy doesn't like looking at her parents and remembering the screaming matches they used to have, so she tends to focus on that part.

The second wedding Lucy attended, her Uncle Ron and Aunt Hermione’s, is the first one she remembers: she and Molly and Victoire (who seemed so much more mature then but was really only eleven months older) being squeezed into white dresses and instructed carefully on what to do, then toddling down the aisle, her and her twin nearly tripping over their own feet while trying to keep up. Vic was the only one who got to throw flowers, after an incident that involved Molly nearly eating one-something which Lucy teases her about to this day, even though Molly herself doesn’t remember it. 

That wedding is Lucy’s earliest memory-Molly’s is of that year’s New Year’s Eve party. Lucy enjoys both the proof that she has a better memory (again: teasing material) and also the fact that her brain chose a wedding as its first long-term memory. She enjoys feeling like it means something. 

The third wedding she attended was a bit of a scandal, though she didn’t realize why at the time-why did it matter that Uncle George and Aunt Angelina had waited until after they had Freddie to get married? Lucy didn’t understand the way her Gran had tutted or the words “out of wedlock”, which some people kept throwing around. Her parents both thought those people were being silly anyway-the first time in a month they’d agreed on something non-work-related. And Lucy got to be a flower girl again-just her and Molls, with no pesky older cousin to keep up with!

As an adult, Lucy still thinks those people were being ridiculous. Wasn’t it enough to see the look on her uncle’s face as it sunk in that he was really married?

Lucy didn’t go to another wedding for years after that, but she did go through a divorce. Around a year after Uncle George’s wedding her parents finally gave up on making it work and started talking about separation. She remembers that she was extremely upset at first, but as soon as she found out she’d be able to see her mother on the weekends she calmed down. Molly took it a bit harder and kept asking why they couldn’t just stay together. Her parents didn’t really have any good answers to that. But soon enough Mummy moved out, and three months later the divorce was finalized. 

Most people assume it was hard for Lucy to grow up as a child of divorce, but it wasn’t. She thinks it actually helped that it happened when she was so young-she has many more memories of her parents apart than together. It also helps that they both ended up remarried, and even as a 28-year-old woman, a wife and a mother, quickly rising through the ranks of the Ministry, she still likes to think of her parents’ marriage and divorce the way they portrayed it to her as a three-year-old: something that helped them both grow as people and gave them their beautiful daughters, something they don’t regret despite the happiness they later found with others.

The fourth wedding Lucy attended was her Mum’s and Julian’s. She liked Julian-he was funny and nice and was good at storytelling. When she told Julian that, he’d laughed and said “Well, I sure hope I’m good at it, because it’s my job!” Julian was an author, and he made a lot of money, but more importantly, he made her mother smile.

Lucy and Molly had insisted on being bridesmaids, not flower girls-after all, they were almost nine now! Mum had laughed and agreed, and so the three of them had walked down the aisle together, the twins just behind and on either side of their mother. They’d given her away and then stood back to watch while Mum and Julian said their vows. There was dancing afterwards, which Lucy and Molly were finally old enough to really participate in, and cake, which was delicious. Even her dad danced once Oliver persuaded him. Lucy was of the opinion that Oliver was a very good influence on her dad-she liked books almost as much as he did, but you still had to have fun!

She and Molly had worn themselves out jumping around and then fallen asleep in a chair together, Lucy’s new glasses digging into her nose where it was pressed into a cushion. That day is still one of the Top Ten Best Days Of Her Life (and yes, she has a list. She has lists for a lot of things).

She had been expecting the fifth wedding to happen for years before it actually did. The reason for this was simple: She had always expected that her dad would marry Oliver, ever since he had tentatively told her they were dating around a year after her parents started talking about divorce, but they had to wait for it to get legalized. When Dad had first told her that, Lucy hadn’t understood why it wasn’t legal already, but after a long speech about how people automatically distrust things they consider “other” (which may have been a little heavy for a four-year-old, looking back on it), she had grasped the concept, but was still certain that one day it would happen.

And she had been right. A little over four years after her Mum’s wedding to Julian, same-sex marriage was finally legalized in the United Kingdom. Molly and Lucy had immediately begged their dad to propose to Oliver. Molly was a tad more enthusiastic than Lucy-she adored Oliver, and had been firm since she was five years old that she would be a Quidditch player like him one day. She was on track to do it, too, having made the Gryffindor Quidditch team in her second year and quickly become a valued Chaser.

After they’d given Dad a sufficient pep talk, he made up his mind to ask Oliver to marry him. This delighted the twins, who quickly threw themselves into wedding planning, despite their father protesting Oliver hadn’t actually said yes yet. He did, of course, and the wedding took place on Christmas (which was Lucy’s idea, thank you very much). Molly wore a red dress and Lucy wore a green one, in order to match both their houses and the holiday spirit. It was a beautiful ceremony, and Lucy may have cried a little (not a lot, because she was a mature thirteen-year-old). 

That was the first time Lucy found herself imagining what her own wedding would look like. She decided she didn’t really care about the details as long as her future husband loved her. If he loved her, it was sure to be perfect.

The rest of Lucy’s Hogwarts career passed without any weddings, and she graduated as Head Girl with top marks to boot, as she’d always known she would. And shortly after her graduation there was exciting news: Teddy had proposed to Victoire! Lucy was ecstatic for her cousin and offered to help in any way she could. She was a bridesmaid once more at the sixth wedding she attended, and she got to dance with several of Victoire’s handsome French cousins.

Lucy knew it was a bit unusual for her to have never had a serious boyfriend. Most British wizards married someone they’d known or dated at Hogwarts, what with the population being so small. But it wasn’t her fault she hadn’t yet met a boy smart enough to keep up with her. Her and Molly's best friends could, but Lucy wasn’t interested in women. And she preferred foreign wizards anyway.

The seventh wedding she went to was very exciting, because it was Molly’s. Her twin had accepted her boyfriend Jacob’s (second) proposal, and Lucy was going to be the maid of honor. She even had a date to bring with her, even though he was just a friend (“Stop laughing, Molly! He was! Then!”): Benjamin Larsson, a Scandinavian wizard who had recently moved to England and was her coworker at the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. 

Molly was positively radiant, and it wasn’t just because she’d lead the Montrose Magpies to a smashing victory last weekend-she and Jacob clearly adored each other, and Lucy was beyond happy for them, especially after that rocky bit they went through after Jacob’s first proposal. (Turns out Molly had been more affected by their parents’ divorce that either she or Lucy had thought). 

She did end up kissing her “totally platonic coworker” Ben that night, and after a few awkward miscommunications they began dating. A few months into their relationship Lucy mentioned that the fact they had first kissed at a wedding boded well for their future, but quickly changed the subject-she wasn’t ready to talk marriage just yet. 

For a little while there were no more weddings, and then Dominique’s girlfriend proposed to her, and Frank Longbottom proposed to Roxanne, and all of a sudden the Weasley cousins were getting engaged like it was going out of style. Lucy guessed it made sense-most of her younger cousins had had long-term relationships at Hogwarts, and now they were graduating and becoming adults.

So Lucy attended her eighth wedding (Dom and Allison’s) and then a few months later she attended her ninth (Frank and Roxanne’s). And then Freddie proposed to his girlfriend, and James proposed to his (which seemed a tad soon to Lucy since the girl had practically just graduated, but then they had been together for two years), and she was off to her tenth and eleventh weddings. Shortly after that, Louis’ boyfriend proposed to him, and Albus proposed to Scorpius on his birthday. And it was cute, and she was pleased to see all her cousins so happy, but it was also the slightest bit annoying.

She explained her feelings on the matter to Ben one evening as they were having dinner in their flat. “I mean, I am happy for them, obviously, but they’re all getting married so close together! I barely have time to shop for one before it’s off to the next! Couldn’t they space it out a bit more?”

Ben grinned. “Well, I hope you won’t be too unhappy if there’s one more.” Lucy frowned, confused. Did he know something that she didn’t?

And then he held up a ring.

(She said yes, of course, but that didn’t stop her from berating him for adding to the rush.)

And so Lucy attended her twelfth and thirteenth weddings while simultaneously planning her own. It was a good thing she’d taught herself the art of multitasking at eleven, because she’d just been promoted in the Ministry as well. 

Lucy’s fourteenth wedding was by far her favorite, both because it was her own and because she was glad to get it over with. She had been right that it would be perfect as long as her fiancé loved her, which Ben did, but the planning was still a hassle, and she was extremely relieved to be done. But when she finally walked down the aisle on her father’s arm and married the love of her life, she was simply happy.

Hugo proposed to his girlfriend Alice at her reception, and she wasn’t even mad.

Hugo and Alice’s wedding was the one where she started making a list of all the weddings she’d been to in her life. It started with an offhand comment she’d made to Ben: “You know, this is the fifteenth wedding I’ve been to in my life.” Then, a week after the wedding, she found out she was pregnant. The Wedding List became a project she took up to keep her mind off her changing body and to stop her from stressing too much about parenthood.

So when the Scamander twins proposed to Rose and Lily, their respective girlfriends, Lucy was ready. She attended the joint wedding with a baby in her arms and wrote it down as the sixteenth wedding. When Serena and Marissa, her and Molly’s best mates, finally settled down, she wrote it down as the seventeenth.

She isn’t quite sure when she’ll stop. Probably when her master plan succeeds and she becomes the Minister for Magic-she won’t have time for list-making then.

Well. Perhaps she can make an exception for the things that count.


End file.
